


Cake

by BurningTea



Series: Confectionery [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Cake, Cas' wings, Castiel in the Bunker, Don't faint, Happy, I'm afraid the murders are only implied, M/M, No angst at all, Sam POV, She wanted cake, present for a friend
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-21
Updated: 2015-11-21
Packaged: 2018-05-02 15:12:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5252933
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BurningTea/pseuds/BurningTea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean takes a cake from a haunted bakery and has a sudden urge to take said cake to Cas. Sam isn't prepared for what they get up to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cake

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ExpatGirl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ExpatGirl/gifts).



> A present for ExpatGirl. Sorry it's late.

Sam stared dubiously at the box as Dean slid it on to the table. 

“Are you sure we should be taking the cake, Dean?” 

“Live a little, Sammy,” Dean said, “Man can not live by salad alone.”

With his arms crossed, Sam frowned at Dean.

“There are more food groups than salad and pie, Dean,” he said. “And anyway, I’m not questioning your choice in food. That’s from a crime scene. Do you really think we should be taking it?”

“We got the ghost,” Dean said, his fingers skimming over the lid of the pastel blue box as though he was having to persuade himself not to open it. “It’s not like the cake’s haunted. Come on, Sam. Anyway, Cas ought to have a cake.”

Not for the first time recently, Dean failed to mention why Cas needed something. Cas had needed a blanket made of soft blue wool. He’d needed his own laptop and earphones. He’d needed just the right lamp for his room, which had meant trailing round every shop in a city when they were meant to be hunting down a werewolf. Dean could claim he’d known the guy they were after was working in the department store on the north-side of town all he wanted: it had knocked Dean over as he’d been choosing between a delicate glass flute looking thing and something that looked like a skein of green gauze. No way had Dean been on the look-out for the creature that had nearly taken his throat out. And he’d made Sam pay for the lamp. 

The laptop made sense, in a way. With Cas staying in the bunker, and helping out with research, it was just easier to get the guy his own access to the Internet. Sam didn’t know why Cas needed the other stuff. There were plenty of lamps and blankets in the bunker already. And he really didn’t see why Cas needed a cake. 

A smile played at the edge of Dean’s lips as he tapped the box with one finger and stepped away. 

“Best get this back home right away,” he said. “The frosting looks like it’ll taste better fresh.”

Which was news to Sam. Cake was cake. It didn’t exactly have the time-sensitive needs of souffle. Dean couldn’t be thinking the frosting would wilt if Cas didn’t get to eat it as soon as possible. And it was a fourteen hour drive back to the bunker, so ‘fresh’ wasn’t exactly on the cards. 

“You want to set off now?” he asked. “Can we not sleep first? I don’t think the cake’s going to melt.”

Dean grumbled, but he eventually agreed to staying the night, seeing as the room was already paid for. Sam did his best to settle down and ignore Dean, but he woke up a couple of times in the night to see Dean sitting by the table, staring at the cake. 

When they set off the next morning, Dean looked bright and alert, eager to be off, and Sam began to doubt he’d seen his brother sitting up during the night at all. Maybe he’d imagined it. Dreamed it.

He didn’t dream Dean insisting on placing the cake between them on the bench seat, or him kicking up a fuss when Sam didn’t keep an eye on it and it nearly slid off the seat. 

In any case, they made good time to the bunker, and Dean was out of the car with the box and out of the garage before Sam got his duffel from the boot. He made his own way into the living areas, taking Dean’s bag as well as his own. He still had no idea what was so important about getting Cas a cake. 

The library was silent. And empty. 

Sam dropped the bags near one of the tables and headed for the kitchen. With Dean refusing to stop unless it was absolutely essential, he was in need of a cup of coffee. Or ten. 

Happily, the aroma of a fresh pot seeped out into the hallway, speeding his steps, and he made his way into the room to find Cas inspecting a cup. Not a cup of coffee. Just a cup.

“You kind of need to put something in it, Cas,” Sam said, moving past his friend to get to the cupboard.

“It’s for Dean,” Cas said, as though that explained the need to gaze into the cup for an eternity before he used it.

“Okay,” Sam said. 

He was far too tired from the case and from not being able to settle properly the night before, and from the drive back, to care. At least, he cared, of course he cared, but he’d do it with more energy after he’d had a sleep. 

“Well, wake me if anything important happens,” he added as he took his full mug of coffee and headed for his room. There was no sense worrying coffee would keep him awake. It wouldn’t. 

“Of course, Sam,” Cas said, as though he’d been given a sacred trust.

Sam shook his head and smiled to himself as he left Cas behind. If Dean and Cas wanted to have some cake and coffee party without him, that was fine. He just hoped they left him a slice. 

 

**********************

 

They hadn’t left him a slice.

They had, it seemed, managed to knock half of the books from the shelves of the library. And he’d taken hours getting the place back together after the whole invading Frankensteins thing. 

“Won’t shut up about me leaving one plate on the side, but he thinks books are carpeting,” Sam muttered, stooping to pick up an ancient tome about some obscure cult from Western Europe. “Does he think books pile themselves back on shelves?”

When he lifted the next book from its holiday on the floor, he saw something wedged between the pages. It took a couple of tries to get it out, his co-ordination thrown by lingering sleepiness. 

“A feather?”

It was black, and downy. He had no idea what kind of bird it was from or how it had got there. If Dean had taken to cooking up some spell involving black feathers then he’d better have a good reason. They’d just got done with a case. Sam needed at least a day or two before starting up with something else. 

Tucking the feather into his pocket, he picked up a few more books. Huh. Another feather drifted down, this one slightly larger and bent, as though it had been twisted. 

“Okay, what is going on?” Sam asked. 

A ringing crash from somewhere further into the bunker drew him away from the books. Leaving the ones he’d collected on the table, he headed in the direction of the noise. It had sounded like it came from the gym. 

He found three more feathers on his way there, each larger than the last. What the fuck was Dean up to?

Just outside the gym, a plate smeared with frosting sat on its own. He couldn’t for the life of him imagine why it had been abandoned out here. Right now, he needed to find out what had caused the sound, so he stepped around it and pushed open the gym door. 

Inside, it was dark. Light from the hallway spilled into the space, smudging the darkness into something full of half-registered shapes. Sam knew what was in here: a few weight machines, a treadmill Dean had brought home one day and refused to admit was because he’d been feeling a little pudgy, a punching bag hanging from a chain. In the dimness, they loomed larger than they really were. 

Walking carefully, Sam crept into the space, his hand reaching for the light-switch. This was home. It should be safe. Should be. It was an important distinction he’d more than learned over the years.

One shape was larger than the others. And he didn’t remember anything being in the spot on the floor. And it moved.

Sam had the light on in an instant, his other hand reaching for the knife he always kept on him. And…

“Cas?”

Cas lay on the floor, his hair even messier than usual and giant fucking wings sprouting from his back. Black wings. 

“That… That explains the feathers,” Sam heard himself say.

Any other words trailed off. Cas had wings. Cas was lying in the middle of the gym floor, with wings. He was also asleep. Cas was sprawled mostly on his stomach, the wings draped out to either side, and his arms wrapped around the bundle of fabric he was using as a pillow. A blanket covered most of him, his shoulders and arms sticking out. And… It took a few endless seconds for the rest of it to sink in. 

“Cas? Where are your clothes?”

As Sam’s voice rose, Cas stirred, pulling the bundle under his head closer. Of course Sam had seen Cas in less than the suit and trench-coat. Not often, but enough to know the guy did have skin under there. He’d never really seen Cas so…naked, though. All he could see were his shoulders and bare arms, but he had the sneaking feeling Cas wasn’t wearing anything under that blanket.

“Cas?” he tried again.

This time, Cas blinked awake, twisting his head to scowl up at Sam. His voice was rough and deep. Even more so than usual.

“What is it, Sam? I’m sleeping.”

“Why?”

Out of all the questions thronging Sam’s head, that wasn’t even in the top five, but it was the one that popped out first. It was joined by a twinge of worry. Cas sleeping was not a good thing. At least, it had never been a good thing in the past.

“Because I’m tired,” Cas said, as though any other answer was unnecessary. 

“Because of the wings?”

Sam blurted it out without stopping to phrase it better. In his defense…wings. It was hard to keep his brain running at full capacity when his best friend had grown honest-to-God wings and decided to have a nap, sans clothes, on the floor of the gym. 

“Because Dean is very tiring,” Cas corrected, and closed his eyes. “I’ll talk to you when I’m awake.”

“Yeah,” Dean’s voice came from the other side of Cas. “Go away, Sammy.”

It was only then that Sam noticed the hand buried in Cas’ far wing, the feathers bunching up around it. Dean’s hand. Attached to an arm with no shirt or jacket. 

“Are you sleeping on the floor, too?” Sam asked. He really couldn’t be blamed if his shock made him sound dazed.

“Not with you yammering on,” Dean said. “Do what Cas says and fuck off.”

In the absence of anything even approaching an explanation, Sam did.

 

*************************

 

He had the library almost back straight by the time Dean and Cas stumbled into the room. They were dressed, so there was that at least. Or rather, Dean was dressed and Cas had managed to get as far as his pants. 

The angel yawned and stretched as he made his way across the room, the muscles flexing and the tattoo down near his hip seeming really obvious. Sam hadn’t even given much thought to the shape Cas was in, but he could imagine a fair few people enjoying the sight. Dean seemed to be one of them. The glint in his eye was softened by the dopey grin. Cas caught Dean staring and smiled back, the warmth reaching his eyes and setting them nearly to glowing.

“What have you two been smoking?” Sam asked.

Tearing his eyes from Dean with obvious difficulty, Cas looked thoughtful. His wings shifted as he turned to face Sam, settling against his back. Sam needed to get a closer look at that. How anything so huge could be shoved on the back of a human-shaped vessel without some serious adjustment to the musculature was beyond him. 

“I suspect it was something we ate,” Cas said, sounding far too practical and business-like for a guy standing around with no shirt on. And… were those hickeys? “The cake, to be precise.”

“No way,” Dean said, shaking his head. “That cake was quality. I got it for you special. To celebrate.”

“To celebrate what?” Cas asked, as though it had only just occurred to him to ask.

“Well…” Dean trailed off, looking confused. “You know what? I have no idea. It just…seemed really important you had that cake.”

“And it seemed really important that we ate it at once,” Cas said, apparently coming out of whatever weirdness they were suffering from for long enough to work this out. “There must have been something about it.”

“Yeah,” Dean said, his grin growing. “It was freakin’ awesome cake. That frosting alone…” He let out a low whistle. “Man, is there anything better than cream cheese?”

In Sam’s view, there were plenty of better things, like, just for instance, not finding his brother and his best friend most likely naked and wrapped up together on the floor of their home. He kept that to himself, though. For now.

“It was good,” Cas said, as though that meant something different to him. “Which only goes to show something strange was going on. I shouldn’t be finding food that enjoyable. Not now I have Grace again. But I couldn’t stop eating it.”

“And around which slice did the wings turn up?” Sam asked.

“What?” Cas squinted at Sam, and then turned his head to peer over his own shoulder. His eyes widened. “How did that happen?”

“Wait, you didn’t know they were there?” Dean asked. “I had my hands all over them. You didn’t notice?” 

He sounded almost hurt, like his performance had been criticized, and, wow, that was not a thought Sam needed to be having. Not about Dean.

“Of course I did,” Cas said dismissively. “But I always feel it when you touch them. You don’t normally know you’re doing it.”

Now it was Dean’s turn to look stunned. Not that Sam found that revelation much less shocking.

“You- I? What?” Dean managed.

“You’ve touched my wings before, Dean,” Cas said. “At first, not knowing enough about humans from a close perspective, I thought you must know, but then I realized it was an accident. Still, I… I must confess to not wanting to stop you from doing it. I apologize if I crossed a line.”

He actually looked and sounded bashful, or sheepish. 

Dean stared at him for a while as though trying to decide whether to be cross, and then his smile broke back out and he reached out to punch Cas lightly on the shoulder.

“Nah, it’s cool. After the places I’ve had my hands now, seems stupid to get worked up over it.”

“Dean!” Sam snapped. He would need some time to erase that comment from his mind, and the way Cas flushed and smiled. “Can we focus? Did the cake make Cas’ wings show up?”

Wing-summoning cakes had not been on his to-do list when he woke up less than an hour before. 

“You can see the, too?” Cas asked. He didn’t sound upset. It was more that he was clarifying the situation.

Sam didn’t bother pointing out he’d already mentioned it. It was clear Cas hadn’t been paying full attention to Sam back in the gym.

“Yeah. So, let’s get this right. You both felt compelled to eat that cake, your wings have turned visible, but they were already there and Dean could already touch them-”

“You could, too,” Cas said, and something about the way he said it told Sam the angel was anxious that Sam didn’t feel left out.

“Right,” Sam said, because there were times when being left out would be better. It was one thing for Dean to be touching up Cas without knowing, but Sam didn’t want in on the act. “And then you took off all your clothes and decided the concrete floor of them gym looked like a good place for a nap?”

“I’m relatively certain the first clothes came off in here,” Cas corrected. He brightened, pointing over to a pile of books Sam hadn’t looked at yet. “There’s my jacket.”

Dean shrugged. 

“I’d have got them off you sooner if you’d stopped licking frosting from my fingers.”

“Okay, enough!” Sam said. “I don’t need to know. Whatever that cake did to the two of you, we need to figure it out.”

Dean opened his mouth as though he intended to say something else, but at a glance from Cas he let it go. 

“Very well, Sam,” Cas said. “What do you propose?”

Under Sam’s direction, they tidied up the room, Dean pulling faces and grinning at Cas when he found the angel’s shirt tangled under a pile of papers, and Sam set about looking into anything that could cause an angel’s wings to appear. Cas made some helpful and some less helpful comments. Dean mainly sat and swayed towards Cas whenever Sam wasn’t actively making him do something else.

Finally, Sam pulled up the photos they’d taken of the crime scene, and Cas came to look at them over Sam’s shoulder.

“What are you even hoping to find?” Deana asked. “Don’t you think Cas would’ve noticed anything on the cake?”

Ignoring him, Sam clicked through the photos, pausing when Cas reached over and tapped the screen.

“What’s this?” Cas asked.

“That?” Sam looked at the photograph of a room with large wooden tables and various pieces of baking equipment. “That’s a workroom out back of the shop. Why?”

Cas traced his finger along the screen, tracking across several sheets of paper tacked to the wall of the room. Sam jumped as something tickled his cheek and looked sideways to see Cas’ wings up close. 

Cas must have felt or seen Sam jump, because he stood up quickly and pulled his wings back. Sam tried not to react to having a huge pair of black wings arching up just behind him. Cas was probably only trying to be helpful.

“Um, the symbols on the paper,” Cas said. “They’re spell-work.”

“The frosting designs?” Dean asked.

Sam leaned in and looked closely at the sheets. They’d been told the drawings were designs for decorating cakes. At the time, that had made sense. Nothing about those drawings had seemed weird. Now, he wondered how he’d missed it.

“Are those… Are they sigils?” he asked.

“Yes,” Cas said, nodding. “Some of them. A mix of symbols. Quite fascinating. This one, down by the bottom of this sheet,” and Sam had no idea how Cas could see that, but he was an angel, “acts to camouflage the spell-work. That explains why you didn’t notice at the time, and how Dean and I both missed it on the cake.”

“Great.” Dean threw his hands up, but he didn’t seem all that bothered. “So now we have no way of knowing what the spell was.”

“Actually,” Cas said, frowning, “I think this is one which stops working once you realize it’s there. I can remember shapes on the frosting, now. Hang on. I think I can draw them.”

Sam watched as Cas took a sheet of paper and drew sigils in a sure, elegant sweep. Dean looked to be watching, but from the way his tongue swiped over his lips more than once, he wasn’t so much looking at the drawing as at Cas’ hands. Sam didn’t want to know why that gave Dean such a hungry, eager look.

“That’s all of it,” Cas said at last. 

Swirls and circles and some jagged lines covered the sheet. If Sam had noticed it on the cake, there was so much there he’d probably have though it was some attempt at abstract cake design and move on. 

“What does it mean?” he asked.

“A protection sigil for itself,” Cas said. “And this part grants a wish.”

“A wish? What the fuck did you two wish for?”

Sudden silence greeted Sam. Maybe it had been a bit blunt.

“Wait, so it’s not some sort of love spell?” Sam asked, because they were certainly acting that way.

“No,” Cas said. “No, it’s perhaps less a wish and more an encouragement to do what you dearly want to do.”

“So, Dean dearly wanted to…?” Sam leaves that hanging. 

It’s not that he’d missed the way Dean and Cas have looked at each other for years, but he’d gone past thinking they’d do anything about it. Oh, sure, for a good while he’d thought something mush have happened in Purgatory, but when Cas had been helping Sam to track down Dean, he’d made a few comments that cast doubt on that. Sam had resigned himself to being stuck with two people who’s epic staring and weirdly intimate touching of faces would just be a thing for the rest of their lives.

He had not signed up for naked gym time. With added wings.

“And I wanted Dean to see my wings,” Cas said. He smiled again, as though trying out the fact he could. “I must have called them forth myself, although I’m fairly surprised I had the energy. Or that they’re in such good condition.”

“Maybe the spell helps your wish come true?” Dean asked. “I mean, you kissed me back, man.”

“That doesn’t prove anything,” Cas said. “I’d have kissed you back whenever you did that.”

He said it in such a matter of fact way that Sam wa prepared for how heated Dean’s look got. He certainly wasn’t prepared for Dean to launch himself around the table and end up in Cas’ arms, kissing him deeply and thoroughly. And right by Sam’s head.

Cas’ wings flared out further, knocking books from a shelf and almost sending a whole stack of papers crashing from the table. Sam had a decent idea of how the library had got so messed up, now.

In the interests of harmony, and because shouting does nothing, Sam retreats to his room, making a point to never eat cake again. Although he might buy one for Cas and Dean to celebrate them finally getting their heads out of their asses. 

 

*************************

 

A few days and a load more research confirmed the spell was benign, meant to be a boost to a friend of the baker whose shop had attracted an angry ghost. The baker laughed when she heard the cake got two love-struck, emotionally challenged people together and offered to make a cake with no spells but a lot of celebration to give to them. Sam asked for an apple cake.

This time, Dean and Cas left him a slice.


End file.
